5 Entry-Points in Design Thinking for Shared Governance

Credit note: The pictures and templates here are from resources created by the Education Design Lab.

Shared governance is an embedded element of American higher education. While difficult to define, the spirit of shared governance means that those who share responsibility for realizing the vision of the institution also share in its decision-making authority. This can encompass central leadership, administrators, faculty members, and even students and alumni. While this waxes and wanes between who has a say and who has their way, what shared governance looks like and means at a given college continues to be a point of debate.

While the debate continues, and rightfully so, I see design-driven innovation as a layout for shared governance. More specifically, design thinking, a methodology within design-driven innovation, offers multiple entry-points for shared governance as a co-creative process. This co-creation espouses the spirit of shared governance, and in this way design thinking presents a process for colleges to employ shared governance. In this post, I will explore what 5 of these entry-points are and elaborate on how they are an opportunity for co-creation (ergo, shared governance) in higher ed.

1. Problem and question framing

The inner-most box is the “How might we…” design question, and the outer-most are statements considering who, what, why, and how.

What it is A design challenge begins with a problem statement, a description of a pain-point or an opportunity that is general but relevant. Through a series of exercises, the statement evolves from a general description into an actionable and impactful design question, beginning with the phrase, “How might we…” This sets the stage not just for a specific problem to be solved, but for a larger challenge to be addressed. As the graphic demonstrates, the process of refining is dynamic, stretching between how the challenge looks as a statement and a question (you could easily, for example, reverse the above arrows, to move from statements toward a question).

Opportunity for co-creation Semantically, the “How might we…” genesis sets a group mentality for tackling the challenge. More critically, involvement of university individuals to iterate, refine, and convert the original statement toward a question means that the ultimate design question is what they want to work. Outside thinkers might help push their thinking, but the design question is ultimately owned by those responsible for the problem.

2. Empathy mapping

What it is Empathy maps visualize the emotional and cognitive experiences of those who experience the problem embedded within the design question, both in terms of the deliverer, such as an advisor, and a user, such as a student. These experiences include what individuals might think, feel, see, say, do, and hear within the context of the problem.

The above template is for empathy mapping, where you would put a person experiencing the problem you’re solving for at the center (say, a first-generation admitted student) and then consider the different emotional and cognitive experiences of that person — what they think, feel, see, say, do, and hear.

Opportunity for co-creation In the design sessions I’ve run for higher education administrators and faculty members, empathy mapping tends to be the exercise they most enjoy. It can be cognitively and emotionally difficult as you immerse yourself in the mind of another experiencing a problem. Involvement in co-creation by participants at the basest of levels is critical, such as the advisor who regularly councils a suicidal student or an admissions officer who must constantly face poverty among high-potential but also high-needs applicants. This can all be done in addition to including the students actually encountering these problems, ensuring that the co-creation incorporates these first- and second-hand experiences.

3. Identifying design criteria

What it is Design criteria are those qualities that define an ideal solution. Beyond just hopeful aspirations, design criteria bring the solution to your users by meeting their needs. Not only do they serve as way-finders to guide your way forward in ideating, they will also be necessary tools for pressure testing (see #5 below) down the line to ensure your solution is actually solving your problem.

Opportunity for co-creation Emerging from exercises like empathy mapping, design criteria are the tools co-creators use to provide parameters to a solution. If a solution doesn’t meet the needs of the students, then it isn’t a solution at all. Further, design criteria are the mechanisms for ensuring that a co-created solution meets the needs of those students for whom you are solving, not just all students generally. While you may hope all ships rise with the tide, co-creating with stakeholders by including them in identifying design criteria — not just asking their opinion, but having them actually identifying criteria — connects their needs to those features offered in a solution.

4. Ideating

What it is This one is a bit general. In a robust design thinking process, ideating actually occurs over a series of exercises, from brainstorming of “anything goes” ideas to narrowing those ideas into visualized concepts. In all of this, all of the work done up until now moves the challenge into actual solutions. Although I’m lumping all of these exercises under the broad category of ideating, each step within this category has its own utility, purpose, and outcomes.

An example of early-stage ideation, this concept development template has participants identify a theme in the challenge (such as was derived from empathy mapping in #2 above) and then challenges them to draw out ideas that expand on that theme.

Opportunity for co-creation While co-creation occurs in each step of the ideation process, I wanted to include it here broadly because this is where co-creators bring into the world something from nothing. General exercises crowdsource the group’s nascent thoughts, whereas sketching concepts presents visualizations that emerge from one participant and spark new thoughts in another. Amidst this entire dynamic, the participants — in this case, university officials — are the ones expanding and converging the ideation.

5. Pressure testing

What it is The ideas that emerge throughout ideation are not merely meant to solve the problem, but rather to provide you with something you can learn from. In fact, a lot of the early stage ideas that come out are inefficient, illogical, and wholly improbable. But none of that matters, because the point is to arrive at something that you can test, and in testing, for you to learn. Pressure testing is just one of these mechanisms, where you bring together stakeholders to use, interact with, and provide feedback on a nascent but workable idea.

Technically, the above is an assumption test, not a pressure test. Regardless, it too exemplifies how you would present an idea to stakeholders and capture their feedback and reaction on particular aspects of the idea that are important to the co-creators.

Opportunity for co-creation During pressure testing exercises, the commitment to co-creation really doubles down, as it requires bringing in new stakeholders who have not been a part of the design process so far, and so have not been “tainted” with what the idea is supposed to do or how it is supposed to function. Similar to a peer review process, pressure testing is when you get to learn whether the ideas produced so far resonates with those you’ve designed with, such as instructors, and for, such as students.

Conclusion

I’ve made the intentional mistake throughout this piece of swapping out shared governance for co-creation. If that is a valid exchange, then the design process described above provides multiple entry points for co-creation. In other words, a true design process incorporates the spirit of shared governance. I use the word “true” here because it is very easy to mask exercises in a faux co-creation; the spirit of shared governance necessitates that the co-creators each enjoy the same decision-making and creative authority if the process is to indeed be a co-creative one.

But there I go again, interchanging co-creation with shared governance. In another piece, I’ll explore whether this is a valid equation. In the meantime, has this piece challenged your thinking on whether a design process can incorporate co-creation at the beginning, end, and throughout? What have I missed? And is this all a feasible application of higher ed’s commitment to shared governance?